


June 2019 Writing Challenge: Beetlejuice

by verfound



Series: June 2019 Writing Challenge [3]
Category: Beetlejuice (TV 1989), Beetlejuice - All Media Types
Genre: Challenge Response, F/M, Gen, Hardcore Character Death, Heavy Angst, Mass shooting, Prompt Fic, School Shootings, The last one is for giggles though, Tissue Box Warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-03
Packaged: 2020-06-03 16:52:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19468129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verfound/pseuds/verfound
Summary: Four ficlets written for a writing challenge, in which: Lydia graduates; Lydia grows up and forgets Beetlejuice, then Remembers; and Delia mistakes her daughter's sex life for the house being haunted (and is only kinda wrong, really).





	1. 12 June 2019

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
> 
> Note: These were written in a notebook as a writing challenge for June 2019. The goal was thirty days, thirty prompts, thirty minutes (which is why some might seem abrupt: time limit). I’d hit a bit of a dry patch and just wanted to write. These are unedited and mostly just fluff pieces, but I really enjoyed some of them and hey: what’s the point of fic if you don’t share, right? Even if it’s goofball trash.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Tight-Knit  
> Fandom: Beetlejuice  
> Character/Pairing: Beetlejuice, Lydia Deetz  
> Rating: M / PG-16 / Teen  
> Notes: Deals with mass shootings and hardcore character death, though not in a graphic way. Rating more for language. June is a month of goodbyes and partings.

“So what do you think happens now?”

He was halfway through conjuring a cigarette when she asked. His eyes slid over to her to find she was staring up at the moon. It was almost full.

“What d’ya mean, what happens now?” he asked. Scoffed, really. It was a ridiculous question.

“I graduated today, BJ,” she said, running a hand along the spider silk of her dress to flatten it. As if pointing out the fancy clothes would accentuate her point. “I leave for college in two months. Like it or not, things are gonna change.”

“Says who? They don’t have to,” he grumbled. He took an extra-long drag of his cigarette to avoid saying anything else. This was all getting dangerously close to _sentimental_ for him, and that just made him want to vomit.

“They have to,” she said. “It’s not like I can take you to school. I’ll have a _roommate_ , Beej. No summoning in the dorms.”

“Betty always fit in fine around here,” he scoffed. “Colleges are full of freaks. I’ll blend in no problem.”

“Even if you can visit, it won’t be the same. No more popping off to the Neitherworld whenever we like. No more random appearing in my mirror. It won’t be like this again,” she sighed. She leaned against his pinstriped shoulder, and he frowned down at her.

“Like this?” he asked.

“Like this,” she said, nodding. “Just us. You’re my best friend, Beetlejuice.”

“Easy on the B-word, babes,” he chuckled. He nudged her a bit with his shoulder before flicking his cigarette off the roof. Those things would kill him, anyways. “And what are you going on about? Nothing has to change. It’ll still be you and me, babes. You and me against the living and Neitherworld.”

“I’m cold, BJ,” she sighed. He wrapped an arm around her but doubted it would do much good. “And tired. Maybe I’m just talking crazy…but I don’t want us to change.”

“Hey, c’mon, now,” he said, shaking her slightly. He glanced down at the field below before looking back at her. “Stay with me.”

“I can’t, though,” she mumbled. The space behind them flickered, and Juno appeared. He glared at the look she was giving him. He didn’t want her damn sympathy. “That’s what I was just telling you. I’m leaving town, and you can’t come with me. Sure, I’ll be back on breaks, but it won’t be the same. College is going to change everything, Beej.”

God, but this whole fucking town was cursed.

“I don’t think _college_ is what’s going to change everything, babes,” he said, and she followed his gaze to the flashing lights below. To Charles, holding an inconsolable Delia, as he confirmed that yes, the graduate on the stretcher was his daughter. There were so many stretchers, so many ambulances, so many _cops_ …

“…oh,” she mumbled, and he sighed as Juno sat next to her. Didn’t the bitch have anyone else to bother?

“Tragic, when it goes down like this,” Juno said, conjuring her own cigarette. “You always hope they off themselves in the privacy of their own bedrooms instead of making a public spectacle like this. Twenty-six of the graduating class dead, not counting the shooter. That’s a shit-ton of paperwork.”

“Juno,” he said, tightening his grip on Lydia’s strangely still shoulders. Not even a shiver. Hadn’t she been complaining of being cold? He wondered if she was going into shock. If it was even possible.

“What happens now?” Lydia asked. Her voice sounded smaller than he was used to. He didn’t like it.

“Well, Miss Deetz, you are a special case,” Juno said glibly. “We’ve been expecting you for a while now, so most of your paperwork is already done. Fast-tracked, if you will.”

“Fast-tracked?” Lydia parroted, and he growled at Juno. Expecting this? Expecting _this?_ That pencil-pushing son of a –

“So just sign here, and I’ll release you to the custody of your friend here,” Juno continued, handing a stack of papers and a pen to Lydia. She signed them robotically, expression blank, and Juno grinned as she took them back. “So sorry for your loss, dear, and enjoy your afterlife. Beetlejuice, take care of her.”

“BJ?” Lydia asked after Juno had disappeared in a puff of greenish smoke. Her eyes were still wide, glassy. “What do you think happens now?”

He had no fucking clue.


	2. 22 June 2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Reflect  
> Fandom: Beetlejuice  
> Character/Pairing: Lydia Deetz, Beetlejuice  
> Rating: K+ / PG / All Ages  
> Notes: I had this idea AGES ago – quite possibly ten years at least – and have this pic sketched up that I just never did anything with. I found it recently, and plunnies started nibbling again.

The mirror was silent. Still. Empty of everything but the reflection of the room and the woman standing before it. It was, as mirrors go, perfectly normal.

Lydia Deetz, renowned child psychologist, took a deep breath and leaned forward. She placed her palms flat against the top of her dresser and released the breath.

Honesty, she wasn’t sure _what_ she’d been expecting. Mirrors were _supposed_ to be empty.

…right?

_“You can’t see him anymore, can you?”_

She took another deep breath and pushed it out her nose. The question had been so _innocent_ , and Charlie had always been so troubled. She’d thought nothing of it at first.

“See who, Charlie?” she’d asked. He hadn’t looked up from his toy dinosaurs since he’d arrived twenty minutes prior ( _Extinction_ was his favorite game), but he had paused his game then to look up at her.

“The Beetle Man, Dr. Deetz,” Charlie had said. He’d gone back to his dinosaurs as if he hadn’t just rattled her bones. “He misses you.”

Breathing had become difficult. Her hand had shaken so bad she couldn’t take notes. Charlie had glanced up one more time before going back to his dinosaurs to add, “He misses you a lot.”

It had to be a coincidence. A damned weird one, but a coincidence all the same.

When Lydia Deetz was nine her mother had died in a horrible car accident. It was tragic, but it was New York, so by the time she was ten her father was dating up-and-coming Modern Artist Delia O’Hara. By eleven Charles and Delia were married and uprooting the family to move to Peaceful Pines, Connecticut – for Charles’s nerves, which put Mrs. Bennet’s to shame on his best days. It had been a hard time for the youngest Deetz, and she had struggled with the transition. She’d had no friends, her entire family dynamic was changing, and then she’d moved, losing her home on top of it all.

So, yes, she’d been entirely too old for such things, but at eleven years old Lydia Deetz had invented an Imaginary Friend. Actually, she’d invented three.

Adam and Barbara Maitland had been the owners of the house the Deetzes had moved into. They had died suddenly with no living relatives, so their things had remained untouched in the house when the Deetzes bought it. Lydia had pieced together a story, going through what had been left behind, and it wasn’t long before her young, fractured mind truly believed the Maitlands were haunting their old home. They weren’t _bad_ ghosts, though, and Lydia – who had always leaned towards the macabre, even more so after losing her mother – had honestly believed they were her friends.

The _Maitlands_ had disappeared around the time the local handyman – sorry, _Handy Dandy Handyman_ – Mr. Beetleman had shown up. He had been eccentric and had fascinated twelve-year-old Lydia. Lord only knew why Delia had agreed to let such a character in her house, but Lydia had loved him. Mr. Beetleman had quickly become fodder for Lydia’s new ghostly best friend, a poltergeist who was the self-proclaimed ‘Ghost with the Most’. They’d had _such_ adventures, and her imaginary ghost friend had helped her through the worst of her transition. She hadn’t thought of him in years, though. Mr. Beetleman. Her ghost. Her…

“…Beetlejuice,” she breathed, looking back up to her mirror. It was the first time in years – over a decade- that she’d spoken his name. That she’d thought of him.

…that she’d seen his glowing, ghostly eyes staring back at her from the Other Side of her mirror.

“Hey, babes,” his gravelly voice said, making her suck in a breath. He was smiling a heartbroken little smile that was a knife in her gut. “You grew up.”


	3. 23 June 2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Clarity  
> Fandom: Beetlejuice  
> Character/Pairing: Lydia Deetz, Beetlejuice  
> Rating: K+ / PG / All Ages  
> Notes: Continuing from yesterday’s. Ideally, if I flesh this out, there will be at least a chapter or two or more between these two bits, but for these themes I’m just spitballing.

Lydia Deetz was in the middle of a nervous breakdown.

That was, really, the only logical explanation.

She was experiencing a psychotic break. There was some unidentified stress in her life, and it was manifesting in the form of her childhood imaginary friend – ghost – appearing in her bedroom mirror.

“Beetlejuice…” she breathed. The smile on his face became a little less heartbroken at the sound of his name.

“That’s it, babes,” he said pressing his palms to the glass. He looked almost desperate. “Say it again, just one more time…bring me back…”

She felt like she was in a trance, swimming through murky waters. Lost in a dense fog with only the glow of his eyes to guide her. He was calling her, begging her to remember, and if she’d only say his name just _one more time…_

“Beetle…” she breathed, and he pressed closer to the glass. The eager look in his eyes spooked something in her – _though I know I should be wary…_ “No!”

His face fell as she jerked away from the mirror and screwed her eyes shut. He wasn’t real – he _couldn’t_ be real!

_“You grew up.”_

Yes, she had! Twelve-year-old Lydia had needed a friend, desperately so, and had found that friend in an imaginary ghost. But she had grown up! She had made friends, and by the time she had reached high school she had seen the ghost less and less. She had _adjusted_ , and by the time she’d left for college it had been over a year since he’d appeared in her mirror. Thirty-six-year-old Lydia was a happy, well-adjusted adult – she did _not_ need an imaginary friend!

“I was there, babes,” she heard him say. “You just refused to see me. That happens when kids grow up.”

“You’re not real,” she groaned, sinking onto her bed. “You’re not real…”

“I’m real, babes,” he said desperately. “C’mon, Lyds, just _look_ at me. _Please._ ”

She did.

She shouldn’t have.

It was like a dam breaking.

“Though I know I should be wary…” she whispered. His grin was mad, maniacal. “Still I venture someplace scary…”

“That’s it, babes!” he cheered, again pressing close to the glass. “C’mon, c’mon…!”

“Ghostly hauntings I turn loose…” she whispered. She didn’t remember standing, or walking towards the mirror. “Beetlejuice…”

“Yes!” he cried, jumping. Her hand pressed to the glass, and she would have sworn she could feel him.

“Beetlejuice…” she said a second time, her fingers curling against his. He nodded, encouraging.

“One more…” he breathed. Her eyes slipped closed.

“Beetlejuice,” she spoke firmly, finally. She had expected thunder and lightning, the tearing of the veil. She hadn’t expected the gentle, cool breeze that brushed by her before two very solid arms embraced her from behind.

“ _Lyds_ ,” he breathed in her ear, and she choked on a sob.

He was _real._


	4. 26 June 2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Cleanse  
> Fandom: Beetlejuice  
> Character/Pairing: Delia Deetz, Beetlejuice/Lydia Deetz  
> Rating: M / PG-16 / Teen  
> Notes: The best thing about dating a mortal is fucking with her Idiot Parents. (I’m thinking this is set when Lydia’s home for a college break.)

Beetlejuice watched Delia move about the kitchen, waving a smoking bundle of dried herbs (that smelt more like pot than what he was assuming she’d been aiming for (sage)), with mystified eyes.

“What the ever-loving _fuck_ does she think she’s doing?” he asked Lydia, who was peeking around the basement door beneath him. They’d been watching Delia for about five minutes now, trying to plan their best escape.

“Well, it appears that after seven years, she’s starting to wise up,” Lydia said dryly. Beetlejuice squeezed her shoulder, where the hand not holding the door had been resting.

“Babes, if she wants to _wise up_ , someone needs to tell her that’s _not_ how you use that stuff,” he said. Lydia crinkled her nose.

“She said it was sage,” she said. He had to bite back a laugh. _Thought so._

“That is _not_ sage!” he cackled. Delia stopped her chanting and looked around nervously.

“Can you just juice us outta here? I do _not_ feel like getting wrapped up in this,” Lydia sighed.

“No problemo, babes,” he chuckled, and with a snap of his fingers they were back in her room. She sighed as she collapsed on her bed. He floated over to her and booped her nose. Just to catch her attention, of course. “So, spill. What’s she _wising up_ to, again?”

“…she’s starting to suspect the house is haunted,” Lydia said dryly. Beetlejuice blinked before rolling onto his back mid-air, cackling. She lifted a foot to kick his butt.

“Oh, come on, babes!” he wheezed. “That’s frickin’ hilarious! What made her suspect _now?_ ”

“Oh, the usual,” Lydia said airily. “Cold spots, items moving on their own, strange noises…”

Her pale cheeks flushed a pretty pink, further piquing his curiosity. He rolled back over, propping his head on his folded arms to leer down at her.

“Oh?” he asked. “What _kind_ of strange noises?”

Her face turned a darker red.

Seven years ago, when they’d first met and Lydia had been an eleven-year-old kid, he would have enunciated his point with a belch or fart or any number of well-timed, low-brow, crude body humor jokes. But that had been seven years ago. His babes wasn’t a babe any more. (Well, she was still a _babe_ , and she was still _his,_ but she wasn’t a kid. She hadn’t been for a while now.)

He continued to leer down at her, his eyes raking over her flushed skin.

“Oh, you know,” she said, her voice no longer as steady as she’d like. She shifted uncomfortably, amusing him even more. She averted her gaze and said, “…moaning.”

He froze, a thrill running through him. It wasn’t quite delight, and it wasn’t quite fear. It _was_ a strange mix of the two.

“From the basement,” she added after a beat. He gulped. Surely Delia hadn’t heard…they had thought she’d been out, but if she’d been home and close enough to the vent… “Last week.”

Aw, _shit_.

“So now she’s convinced a ghost lives in the kitchen and she must spiritually cleanse the space,” Lydia continued quickly, looking back at him. “And since Mother and I do _not_ discuss my sex life beyond her being vaguely aware I do have one –”

“A damn good one,” he cut in, grinning down at her.

“That I have a damn good one,” she conceded, rolling her eyes, “I will continue to allow her to cleanse the house with pot if she continues to let me sleep with my poltergeist boyfriend, even if she doesn’t realize I’m doing so.”

He laughed so hard he forgot to keep floating, though she didn’t really complain when he landed on her.


End file.
